Wrecked: A Novel (Charming Knights Book 1)

by Shana Vanterpool

  “Why not?” Her accent was so falsely dignified, it made me want to hurl.

  Everyone in Charmant sounded the same. We all had a slight accent, but there was too much snooty in it to count. But Mom’s accent was so much more pronounced, like she wanted everyone to think she was from here. Look, I loved my mother. I did. She did the best she could with her hands full of expensive toys, but all my life I’d yearned for what I had with Illa. Some emotions, some support. Some freaking love!

  “Why isn’t she allowed to talk to me?”

  “Because your father fears you’ll make a new friend.”

  My cheeks blazed. “I’m not a lesbian,” I ground out.

  Mom laughed, pulling her mask down to reveal her dark brown eyes. “Not that kind of friend. You’re too… what’s the word I’m looking for?” She snapped her fingers. “Weak. You want to be everyone’s friend, but you can’t be.” She sat up, honey brown hair falling from her messy bun. That was the only time of the day my mother wasn’t perfect. “You’re going to know what everyone has in their bank accounts one day, Hallie. You can’t be anyone’s friend knowing that. Anything else?”

  I ground my teeth together. “Don’t fire Illa.”

  She rolled her eyes and put her mask back in place. “The old woman is fine. Four measly hours a day. Snow White can pick up the slack. Have a good day, dear.”

  “I’m going to get high and go topless.” I glared at her still body.

  Her lips stretched into a smile. “Your boobs aren’t big enough to go topless. I’d go with your smile. It’s much prettier. And if you’re going to do drugs, don’t smoke. Try coke. It’ll keep your appetite down without wrinkles. Out now, please.”

  My jaw hurt by the time I made it to school. I ground my teeth together so roughly I felt my molars gnashing.

  As I sat in the parking lot, the Charming Knights walked up the stairs together. It wasn’t them that caught my attention. It was the fact that Wreck wasn’t leading them. Kellen Noxmoore was. Trudy Lowell ran over to the group and batted her lashes, saying something that made everyone laugh but Wreck. He hung near the back, hands in his pockets. He was wearing black jeans and a dark blue button down untucked. Black sneakers with the notorious Gucci shimmer on his heel. His bag was over his left shoulder and his gaze was empty and unimpressed.

  When Trudy made a motion with her hand, and everyone cracked up again, Wreck rolled his eyes and looked away, his full lips mouthing, “What the fuck?” before he ran a hand through his hair.

  I smirked, studying him closer. Typically, Wreck was a cheese and smile kind of guy, or burn it to the ground and watch the flames kind of man. I knew his cheese was all an act, but he did it so well I believed him. And I knew his burn was true but didn’t matter. What could he really do with his flames any more than I could with mine?

  When his hand dropped away, his hair had gone from perfectly combed, to mussed. His hair made me think of tiramisu. Light brown, dark brown, gold, and warmth.

  Okay, fine.

  Wreck was kind of, maybe, a teeny tiny bit pleasing on the eyes.

  Taller than most of the guys, he towered over them. And like the rest of the Charming Knights football team, he was lean and muscled. He looked twenty-five, not eighteen. Like all of us were so beneath him. His jaw was swooped in the most perfect hardness, with a straight nose and eyebrows that drew attention to his impeccable haircut and smooth forehead. The guy didn’t even go through that awkward puberty phase like the rest of us. On the last day of middle school, we were all gawky and acne prone. On the first day of high school, he had shaving nicks and good credit.

  But all the Charming Knights were gorgeous. Kellen probably the most in a boy-next-door way. Wreck was a demon down the street. Finger waves in Kellen’s light brown accidently messy hair, light blue shirt stretched across his chest. I swallowed hard studying his smile. White, shining. Kellen seemed to be the sweetest of them all. Easygoing heir to Moore Beans, a coffee chain in every major city. There were four in Charmant alone.

  Geoff Ripford stood beside him, golden skin, thick black hair, eyes so green I could see them from here. The Ripford’s were business men. They put their fingers in good business and invested enough to triple their incomes. Dad told me that the Ripford’s were the kind of enemies you gave the best choices too. So they wouldn’t take them when you weren’t looking.

  Ryder Storm, the only junior in the group, patted Ripford on the back. His mother was the queen in his house. Her cosmetics were so hot, even I had a hard time ignoring their new matte lipstick line. His wayward ice-blond hair and slender frame set him apart, but at the same time, his flawless face and Jimmy Choo sneakers blended him in with ease.

  The Charming Knights ran Charming High School. They would own the town too one day, and the people who worked here didn’t bother putting up a fight when they were around.

  Father would love for me to end up with one of those three.

  Wreck.

  Rip.

  Storm.

  Kellen’s legacy was in coffee. Father would never allow it.

  Which was probably why he looked so damn good to me suddenly.

  4. OBSESSION

  Wreck

  I was melting.

  It was already eighty outside and it wasn’t even eight in the morning. And Kellen Noxmoore was acting like a dumb broad who got a smack on the ass and a ten percent off coupon to Victoria’s Secret. I put my fists in my pockets and played nice, smiling when everyone else did and tossed in a few jokes of my own.

  Inside, I was a dark force in a cold room. I was melting from the inside out.

  A hush fell over the group. I looked past Sadie and Kadie, the diet gum twins, to find Hallie Goodford walking up the stone stairway of Charming High. She had her head straight, tall, long body walking fluidly up the stairs. Chick always confused me. She was heir of Goodford Finance. She was untouchable. She was queen of this town. Only, she’d never once acted that way. Hell, I had huge feet to fill, but she had shoes to wear that were bigger than she’d ever be.

  She was a loner. I always wondered if she knew it or preferred it. No one wanted to get close to her. She knew how much we made, how much we spent, and how much we’d ever be worth. No one wanted that kind of truth in their lives. It was invasive, lifting up our dark parts to see how much fueled us to keep them that way.

  She could have anything she wanted.

  Hallie Goodford could demand our souls on a spit and we’d have no choice but to hand them over.

  Not me, of course. In currency, I was slightly more well off. If the banks went belly up again like they did when I was in middle school, she’d be persona non-grata in no time.

  I remembered the sticky sweat on my father’s face when he’d spend hours watching the stocks. I didn’t understand at the time why he cared so much for someone else’s wellbeing. He certainly hadn’t cared for mine. Now, I got why he’d been obsessed with Ben Goodford all those years. Dragging us to her boring birthday parties, playing her up at the dinner table, shoving Hallie Goodford down my throat when I started checking out women I knew I couldn’t have.

  What could I say? I loved tasting the forbidden fruit. Forbidden fruit in my case were women that my father would rather kill before he let marry me and take my millions. Loved flirting with the housekeepers if they were prime, hence Tula’s sudden disappearance. Loved the interns at the office downtown. Father broke human rights everywhere keeping the staff mostly male.

  Father had been obsessed with Hallie, not because of her money, but because she controlled ours. It was nestled safely in GF. What father didn’t know, was that I knew about the offshore accounts Hallie’s father had hidden behind the government’s backs. The money he siphoned from unsuspecting citizens all over the world. The sheer billions unaccounted for. When you’ve owned the largest bank for decades, no one’s going to look into a few missing dollars. But a few missing dollars stretched over decades becomes a few billion dollars in secret. 6.2 billion to be e
xact.

  I grinned at little Hallie Goodford. How did I know this? Because I was the anonymous investor in their offshore account. Storm helped me hack into the system and insert myself into the roster. Ben thought his system was foolproof, and he wouldn’t question my father if someone new popped up. He’d think they were invited. Plus, I’d dropped the half million initiation fee and had Storm ripping the other half million from my father’s account on Saturday at Kellen’s celebration party. All our fathers saw was the money.

  It was all a backup plan. Steal the dough, transfer it to an offshore account Storm’s lawyer let him in on for a small percentage. Although he wasn’t fooling anyone. A small percentage on 6.2 bill was more than he’d made winning cases for ten years straight. I’d cash out and take off, if my father had a change of heart. He was a heartless man, so it made sense to me that one day I’d do something he couldn’t forgive. Knock up a nobody, do something he didn’t like—run his business into the ground.

  My father and I didn’t have an emotional relationship. It was purely business. And since I turned eighteen this past summer, any pretense of his “love” for me went out the window along with mine. I had to make contingency plans. Or I had this feeling he’d off me to keep Globe Tonight thriving if I threatened him even once. I could easily make the stretch that owning and operating the largest cable news network had taught him a thing or two about covering a story. Father didn’t raise a complete moron.

  No, he raised a little monster just like him.

  “Kellen, stop drooling over the Goodford girl.”

  I tore my gaze from her back just in time to watch Rip smack Kellen’s chest. He gave me a warning look, giving me my smack silently.

  The jab at Kellen was really for me. But Rip was wrong. I wasn’t checking her out. I was thinking about screwing over our fathers. The way they screwed over us.

  A hostile takeover went on the day I was born. Her too, I imagined. I’d seen the way her father looked at her. It was the same way mine looked at me.

  Like we were pawns on their game boards. Every single move was to benefit them. The worst part wasn’t the truth. I’d more or less accepted this life. The worst part was how I understood their choices. I got it so deeply, I’d already started making a few of my own.

  “Someone should invite her to the party tonight.”

  The words were out of my mouth before I could take them back. When everyone looked at me like I’d lost my mind, I offered them a self-deprecating smile and a shrug.

  “Guess I’ll be taking that hit. I’ll put in a good word for our new captain.” I walked over and grinned at Kellen, dropping my arm around his shoulder and putting him into a headlock. Then I fucking squeezed as hard as I could, applying just enough pressure to his larynx to keep him from talking as everyone around us laughed like we were old buddies.

  I put my mouth over his ear. “You look at Hallie Goodford one more time with those stupid fucking love-struck eyes, and I’ll carve them out of your skull. You hear me?” I hissed through my teeth, still grinning for our audience.

  He paused his fight, and then I felt his head nod as best as it could. He sent his elbow into my ribs and I released him, playfully—I wasn’t playing—shoving him away from me. He grabbed at his throat and pierced me with quiet enraged eyes. And though Kellen was one of the better occupants of this city, he was still a piece of shit everywhere else, and the dark quiet rage in his gaze told me he’d be breaking my rules soon.

  That was okay. I had no problem reminding him.

  Storm and Rip, on the other hand, had their arms crossed over their chests and they weren’t laughing like the rest of us.

  Tough crowd.

  The morning bell rang on campus. “Time for class, boys.” I patted them both on the back and then took off. I wasn’t in the mood for Storm’s oppressive silence or Rip’s inability to let things go. The articulate bastard could delve into every emotional depth I lacked for hours. Coldness was better left to freeze.

  Charming High was alive that morning. I nodded at those who nodded at me, smiled in return to the girls who had the balls to flash me one, and ignored the meek ones hanging from their lockers. I felt nothing for those women. I felt nothing period but a deep dark rage. It kept me going, that burning candle. Gave me a reason to know myself before I lost it all to the falsity of my future.

  I stopped at my locker and fished my keys out, unlocking the blue steel door. For a private school, you’d think they’d trust us a little more. I exchanged my things and stood there, half-in, half-out of my locker, stalling as I pretended to line up my textbooks.

  Pretending made for a lot of groundwork. Indifference a wall. I worked hard for my mask.

  Finally, I got what I’d been waiting for. Her wedges came into sight. Dark blue, the color of unwashed denim. Prada. Expensive. In-fucking-toxicating. My heart sped up in my chest as I examined each toe on her foot. They were… proportionate. Little toenails painted the faintest shade of pink, simple, understated, but still somehow sophisticated. Just like her. She tapped the toe of her right shoe on the ground as she did her daily ritual of putting her books back into her locker. She’ll come back here at the end of each period and do the same thing. After school, she’ll bypass her locker completely. Get into her brand-new Audi and drive away from Charming High like spending any longer inside would somehow hurt her.

  I leaned around my opened locker door and let my eyes fall across the side of her face for less than a second. To everyone else, I appeared to be looking at the person next to me. But I’m not looking at the person next to me. I’m soaking up everything I can. The pink angry flush in her cheeks. Her bronze hair was straight and full-bodied, the color of tanned gold. She was average height, probably 5’6.

  Probably made me chuckle quietly to myself.

  There was nothing probable about any of this.

  The truth was, I knew everything about Hallie Goodford.

  EVERYTHING.

  She was in fact five-foot-six-inches. She was eighteen. Her birthday was on June 5th. Gemini. I didn’t show up for her eighteenth birthday, but I sent her a present anonymously from, W. A pair of gold star earrings. Tiny, simple, beautiful and understated. She never fucking wore them. She was not a loner out of choice or even desire. She’s strong enough to stand by herself. Her eyes weren’t glazed over or preprogrammed. They were always on fire.

  Hallie knew this town for what it was. A beautiful gilded cage. But she was restless in her cage. Her feathers were starting to show signs of her constant struggle. One day she’d give up and stop looking for a way out.

  She’d be a pet. The way her father wanted her to be.

  I wasn’t stealing that money for me.

  I was stealing it for her.

  She closed her locker and repositioned her bag on her shoulder, flashing me a curious look. Our eyes locked and I forced everything I’d let forward back.

  “Morning,” I greeted, making my tone nice, genial.

  “Morning, Wreckmond.” She gave me another second to say something, but I closed my locker and started zipping up my bag. I loved leaving her hanging. It rarely happened, and it was a sick desire to have, but I wanted her waiting for me for once.

  I didn’t understand, nor had I asked, for Hallie’s place in my dark mind, but she had a place anyway. She’d had her own place in my darkness since we were kids. I blamed my father for it. Forcing us to interact. Even as a child, I knew people treated me differently than others. Knew I could have what I wanted even if most couldn’t. They fawned over me, adults giving up their integrity to a child. It disgusted me. But Hallie never looked at me like I was better. She was the only person in Charmant who could care less about me.

  She was the only person I bothered to see.

  She’s a mirage. A shimmer in the distance full of desire I’d never get close enough to find out if it was really what I wanted.

  Because I would want it still.

  She hesitated, heart-shaped lips openin
g and then closing. Typically, she ignored me. Said “hello,” and then left. This morning, she obviously wanted to say something.

  “Wreck?” she finally caved once I’d taken a few steps.

  I grinned to myself before wiping the smile off. I turned, pasting a curious look on my face. “Yeah?”

  “Can I ask you something?”

  “Sure. What’s up?” I leaned against her locker, crossing my arms over my chest.

  She bit into her soft bottom lip and then released it with a sigh, meeting my gaze. “It’s about your last housekeeper. Tula.”

  Good girl, Tula. Well, more like good girl, Mom, but Tula had acted like I’d expected her to. Obedient. I put on a show of trying to remember who she was talking about. Not really an act. Dad kept the help old or male to keep them away from me, but Tula was Mom’s idea. She’d lasted a few weeks before Dad caught on. I never bothered to know the help, but Tula was too good not to take advantage of. “The Greek exchange student? What about her?”

  “She’s an exchange student?” she repeated, like a lightbulb went off in her head; it hadn’t sounded like a question. “That’s why she hasn’t been ostracized to Charmant hell.”

  I couldn’t help my response. Hallie was intuitive, smart—she didn’t take the first answer she got, hence this conversation. “Didn’t know Charmant had a separate hell.”

  Her eyes sparked at my joke. She was probably the only person who got that. “Oh, trust me, Wreck. There’s only one.” She smiled self-deprecatingly. “Don’t mind me. Um, Tula. Is there any way you can maybe get your mom to hire her back?”

  “Why?”

  She sighed in frustration. She was flustered. By me? A demon could hope…

  “You won’t care why. I just wanted to know if you could try keeping your dick in your pants this time and take her back.”

  My eyebrows shot up. Genuine shock at her response made my filter lapse. “Why wouldn’t I care?” I know, I know, that dick in my pants comment was begging to be addressed, but I couldn’t exactly pick it over her first comment. That would only prove her right.